Bluuuuhhhhccckkkk!

I had a horrible night and morning! I am just starting Stage 4 and having a terrible time adding these solid foods. I can't figure out what works!!!! Yesterday I successfullly ate an egg beater with low fat cheese for breakfast and 3 oz of imitation crabmeat with FF Hellman's for lunch (yummy). Then at dinner I ate 1 1/2 oz of baked, moist, well flaked haddock over 30 minutes. It tasted delicious, but it would not move and came back up within the hour. For the rest of the night anything else I put in my stomach came back up ginger tea, a SF popsicle, pain medication.... I felt like I wanted to die!!! I felt awful this morning, I'm afraid to eat anything solid and feel totally wiped out. I called the dietician and she said it is not uncommon! She left me a message because of course she called back when I made the one other phone call I made all morning. Any suggestions? I think I am eating small, chewing well and eating slowly but it doesn't seem to make a difference. I am wanting to just stick with my full liquids! Has this happened to others? What seemed to work? Thanks! Luann LapRNY 9/14/04 -29lbs since 8/18/04 PS but I love how thin I am feeling and don't regret the surgery at all!

Hi Luann, Just hang in there. It's a little touch and go in the beginning, but it does get easier. I'm 4 months out and I still can't eat fish...my favorite food. I don't know what there is about it, but it does get stuck. I had a hard time with meat and chicken too. I could handle thinly sliced deli meat, peanut butter crackers, cheese, scrambled eggs, salads, bananas, boca burgers, spaghettos with meatballs and anything that was soft and mushy. I spent 2 months vomiting at least once a day. I think I may have created some of the problems by not eating slow enough, or soft enough, or small enough bites, but I think my system was just irritated from all that vomiting that it couldn't tolerate much. Slowly, things changed and now I haven't been sick in 2 months. It took me awhile to get chicken to go down. I still have problems with bread, steak, rice. I can eat a little pasta now, and I can eat the thinly sliced pepperidge farm bread, but it's very slow eating. Unfortunately, crackers seem to go down easily and it's too easy to eat too many. I'd try something other than fish and see if you can handle it. Good luck. Karen

Just take your time easying into stage 4. I started with one meal a day of solid then I had soft for the rest. Until I knew what my pouch could handle. Also remember that everything has be really moist and chew chew chew. Try one thing per day so you know what you can handle and what you can't. It may seem that it was your fish that didn't settle but it could of actually been anything you had that day, and the fish was the final straw. Just like a baby one thing at a time. I know it is difficult now, because you want to chew something real. Just take your time and everything will work out for the best. Best of wishes. Dawn -100

Dawn's right, just add 1 thing at a time & test what it is that you tolerate & what you don't. Now I can eat fish & chix & even some rice w/o a problem but beef just sits there & so does pasta. So go back to the liquids for a bit to settle back down & then start over again. And even when you think you've chewed it to death...chew some more. I have to remind myself all the time, especially if I am talking & eating at the same time. Donna

dear luann so sorry to hear about your feeling sick. it is frustrating cause sometimes you try something and it goes down great, the next time watch out. i have been lucky and only got sick once, but many times have had that full stuck in my chest feeling and have not even eaten the 3 oz of protein suggested and its happened with chicken and fish too. i to go back to protein shakes or very soft foods for the next few meals and that seems to help. we were talking about this in my post op group tuesday and two women there swore by hot tea drunk very slowly when you have that full feeling(i don't drink hot beverages so no help to me!) they also pointed out to me how far out i was(only 3 mths) and said this would get better, you are not even a month out, at that stage i was still on soft pureed food, so take it slow and congrats on the weight loss!!

Thanks everyone for all the support and good advice! I am feeling much better today and spoke with the dietician. She said fish is tricky because it is so slippery, it can often slide down easily before you have chewed it well enough. I had a much better day yesterday after a fluids only rest and came up with a delicious dinner of noodleless chicken "lasagna". I mixed 1/2 c. ff ricotta cheese with low fat mozzarella, finely diced Perdue Italian grilled chicken strips, 1 egg, black pepper, put it in a small bake dish, covered with 1/2 c. plain tomato sauce (allowed) and topped with a little bit more of the low fat mozzarella and some parmesean. I baked it in the toaster oven for 40 minutes at 350 degrees. It was delicious! One-quarter of the dish =1WLS serving(about 3 oz)= 13 Grm of Pro and 120 calories. YUM! So the trick I think will be to keep things VERY soft and practice that eating slowly! I was a terribly fast eater before, and I guess I still have to work on that! Thanks again, Luann

The noodleless lasagna sounds great - I'm going to try it. I thought ricotta would be good so I bought some but couldn't figure out what to do with it without pasta or carbs. susan

just thoughtn id let you know you can make a moc cheese cake with ricotta using splenda and a couple eggs, add some vanilla and bake for 20 minutes or so ..Add splanda to taste i like mine with cinnamon also .